Billy Purgatory: I am the Devil Bird

by Jesse James Freeman

  Within their ranks was an extra, a short one: Anastasia. One of the women stood behind her with her white hands on Anastasia's shoulders as if to indicate that Billy wasn't the only kid in the room who was in trouble.

  Billy had the paint can and the lighter behind his back now, as if to hide the evidence from them.

  The Vampires were all expressionless, even Anastasia. The grown-ups wore dark clothing and grey coats and all had questioning eyes that focused back to his.

  Billy felt the warmth at his back as the tool casket caught on fire, but his face was cold as he considered them all and how much trouble he truly was in. Billy's board was at the halfway point between him and them and waited quietly too, sitting on its wheels.

  Outnumbered and outmatched, Billy did the only thing he could think of doing. Sending his weaponless arms out to his sides like a hawk, he ran to his board. He took the last five feet in a leap and rolled across the cracked concrete floor right up to the Priest.

  Staring up the skinny vampire's nose Billy gave him a good sneer and howled, “You wanna tell me what you want from up there or you want me to beat you down a notch?”

  It was a bold move, and the rush of natural smack-talking was a supreme confidence builder for the punk hobo kid until the Priest's hand was tightening around Billy's throat. He was fast for an old smelly dead guy.

  “You told me you bit this one.” The Priests words were directed at Anastasia and he looked to her then and held Billy aloft like he wasn't even there.

  Anastasia's face was as bewildered as the rest of the clan.

  “She did,” Billy answered for her, barely able to breathe much less talk. He kicked but was held out far enough so that it was impossible for his short legs to reach his target.

  The Priest's other claw now dug into Billy's hair, pulling it away from his neck and fingers pressed against the tender flesh that Anastasia's teeth had torn into last night. The Priest found what remained of the two puncture marks she had gifted Billy.

  Uncle Priest seemed lost for words and Billy let his feet dangle after another unsuccessful mule kick. The pain from being held by an already wounded neck would be way too much for the boy soon and Billy determined that this is what they wanted. They were counting on him passing out from the pain.

  Anastasia said nothing.

  “You should be turning, boy. Your insides should be roasting in the rich blood of kings. Yet, you live still.” The Priest seemed revolted and fascinated all at once. “Another secret you will share with our Master.”

  Billy had been counting in his head and knew the time was close.

  “I'll tell you a secret right now, friar.”

  Priest raised his eyebrows and the bald monk's brow became ruffled lines of skin aged with the look of an old bookbinding.

  “Hurry then, boy. What have you to say?”

  The Priest released his grip on Billy's throat just enough that he might get a sentence or two out. The other vampires advanced to listen. They pulled iron cuffs with them and a pair of tongs to reach for Billy's skateboard.

  Billy smiled. “Boom!”

  Billy had been paying attention to the whistle from the fire. It was times like this that Billy loved that nobody paid attention to what he did.

  The spray paint can he had dropped into the fire hadn't been able to last as long under pressure as Billy had that night, and the explosion was loud and sent fire and shrapnel flying about the room. Anastasia's casket went to pieces and sent flames up the wall and ignited the trash everywhere.

  Billy was glad then that some of those dopey stories kids told to scare other kids were true. Vampires don't dig sudden bright light and they hate fire.

  The Priest couldn't hold Billy and turn away at the same time.

  Billy landed hard on his back atop his board, which didn't do much for his lungs as they struggled for air, but he pushed against the concrete with his legs and sailed through the new wall of flames.

  Billy rolled across the floor on the other side of the firewall and huffed in air that smelled like burning paint but was sweet all the same.

  He ran up the mountain of circle-saw blade rust and crashed through the remains of a windowpane. Billy flew into the outside world and crashed into the ground with a sudden stop – his skateboard clutched to his chest.

  The vampires were quick as ever, and their swarm was all about him as he pulled himself from the ground. They were no longer expressionless, and they were going to take him trying to make them explode all personal like now.

  Billy Purgatory laughed just the same. “That's the coolest stunt I've pulled all day.” Soon to be defeated perhaps, but ever proud and reveling in small victories.

  He found Anastasia standing and watching him. Billy directed his happiness her way.

  “Humans are crafty too, double-crossin' vampire trick!”

  Anastasia held a look that said she might be afraid for what her kind was about to do to him. She also showed him that his words might have actually hurt her feelings.

  “Lose the sad face, doll. Don't act like you care.” He wasn't falling for anymore of her acts.

  Vampires began to menace closer. Billy could hear their teeth chatter.

  Billy reared back with his board ready to swing. “Lone Wolf!”

  The roar of motorcycle engines quelled the crackling of the fires and the chatter of vampire fangs. Headlights, big bright ones, attached to big bikes. Billy knew what a Harley sounded like; he just hadn't known what thirty of them sounded like together until that moment.

  It sounded like Thor smashing a beer bottle over a fat cloud.

  The vampires silently circled their wagons and watched the long slow moan coming down the highlands beyond the sawmill, the headlights weaving down the trails and then slow circling the grey cloaked Nosferatu.

  The lead rider was a man vast in stature. He let his hog idle as he kicked out his left leg. It was like a sequoia trunk wearing a pair of dirty jeans and black boots.

  He had a big belt with a buckle that was engraved with a military plane dropping a bomb. His T-shirt was even more hardcore emblazoned boldly with a skull with a grenade in its mouth. The shirt was ripped and near the right shoulder it looked like it had been altered by a few bullet holes. Dried blood was the fashion accessory that held it all together. The man wore a necklace of spent machine gun shells and dog tags.

  He had a beard like a Viking, red mixed with white and a ring in his nose like a bull. The guy was covered in tattoos, and not the kind that jerk-off guys get to look rough. These were the homemade kind - like if your home is prison.

  He pulled a knife, which was almost a sword, from his boot and sliced the end off a cigar. Putting the Cuban in his teeth, he chewed down and the match he struck off the side of his gas tank mixed with the light coming off the burning building to light up his face.

  He had a scar across his mug, just like Billy's.

  “That boy don't look like he belongs with you.” His voice was a rhino dragging its ass across a gravel road.

  The Priest was the only vampire who stepped out of their circle.

  “One of mine was lost and she and the boy found one another.” The Priest was doing a great job pretending to stay calm.

  “Thanks for finding him,” said the man. “He's coming with us now.”

  The Priest took a step towards Billy.

  “Unless you got a problem with that?” The voice of the biker was peppered with gasoline-laced promises of war if there was a problem. They looked ready for an epic fight.

  One of the women stepped beside the Priest and hissed at the man, showing off her fangs.

  The biker took a drag off his cigar, unmoved.

  “You know who I am, right?” The biker studied his cigar as he asked the question, paying the hissing vampire fatale no mind.

  The Priest nodded and the vampire woman took another step towards Billy.

  “Then you best tell your bitch to sheathe them fangs.”

  She went to hi
ss again, but it was the Priest who pushed her back, and he did so assertively and with violence.

  “All of our children are safe now,” said Uncle Priest. “Lessons learned.”

  The Priest and the Biker stared at one another, then finally nodded. The Biker reached out his gloved hand to Billy.

  “Come here, kid. We got a long ride ahead.”

  Billy grabbed his board and climbed up onto the back of the bike. The biker was huge, and Billy couldn't see anything except the back of his leather jacket.

  Worked into the leather jackets they all wore was a devil horned clown skull with fangs and a serpent's tongue.

  And the words:

  LUCIFER'S CIRCUS MOTORCYCLE CLUB EST. SAIGON 1971

  “Who are you, dude?” Billy yelled up towards the biker's ears.

  “I'm Mudder Kelroy. I'm taking you to your Pop.”

  Billy smiled, but it was short-lived. As they rolled past the line of vampires before fading into the trees Billy saw Anastasia again mouth those words: “Run Billy. Run.”

  Chapter 8

  The Road Goes On Forever

  Mudder Kelroy and the Lucifer's Circus Motorcycle Club pulled off the highway and down a gravel road. Billy, riding on the back of Mudder's bike, couldn't tell where they were going or in what direction. He had no way to know if he was making his way closer to home or getting ever further away.

  Billy wasn't even sure how many days he'd been gone. Time seemed a lazy blur to the ten-year-old boy, one picture laid over another and the details in between barely connecting the frames.

  He was lost again, in more ways than one.

  The trees opened up and Billy caught sight of the top of a covered wooden bridge just ahead. He had to look around the big biker's girth to see beyond that, all the while holding onto whatever he could grab to keep from getting bumped off and keeping his skateboard planted firmly beneath his left arm.

  Billy saw that there was a lake and the wooden bridge led to a tiny island with a large house in the center of it. What little useful moonlight Billy could gather to aid his vision showed the house to be three stories high with a porch that went around the place. Gigantic but old now, it was bigger than Billy's house, but in far more of a state of disrepair – which was really saying something. The once white paint had long since greened near the ground and greyed near the sky. Billy would learn years later that such a fancy place was called a Victorian.

  Mudder slid his bike to a stop at the steps that led up to the porch and a screen door by a swing. Twisting around, the biker took Billy by the shoulders and planted him down beside the bike. Billy felt like his whole body was still shaking from the vibrations of it all – and the big engine still rumbled.

  “You hang here, kid. Me and the boys'll be around back. You're safe here, but don't be going down the lake. There's alligators.”

  Mudder snapped his big arms together like a gator closing its jaws.

  Billy's face lit up like it was Taco Day at the school cafeteria. Mudder studied the boy's delighted face and scratched at his beard. “That don't do a lot to dissuade you does it?”

  Billy didn't know what that meant, but he did know he was going down to the lake.

  Mudder caught the thought balloon and shook his big head. “Okay, forget that. I was just funnin'. There ain't no gators.”

  “Son of a bitch!” Billy kicked the rock drive, all hopes for anything cool tonight were destroyed.

  “Just stay around the porch, okay. We'll be drinkin' and carryin' on out back at the fire. Your daddy wouldn't like you cavortin' near such activities.”

  “Pop don't care. He drinks all the time.”

  “Well, he didn't used to.” Mudder pulled at his beard again.

  “I go on beer runs. I'll skate to the store for ya.”

  Mudder raised a massive hand. “We're stocked, thanks.”

  Billy walked over to the steps and reluctantly placed his backside down on them. “When is Pop coming to get me? How long have I gotta stay on this stupid porch?”

  Mudder made the cigar in his mouth glow brightly and his words left his mouth mingling with smoke. “He'll be coming down the mountain. He's been up at his cabin.”

  “Cabin? Pop doesn't have a cabin.”

  Mudder gripped the handlebars. “Yeah, he does have a cabin and it'll take him the rest of the night to come down from it. We'll meet him over yonder up the high woods in the mornin'.”

  “More woods. This all blows.”

  “Calm that mouth of yours down. Don't be waking up Ms. Lee Anna.”

  “If that bike ain't waking her up I don't see how I could. I mean, I can make lots of noise, but…”

  Mudder began to roll forward. “She's used to this kinda noise, sleeps right through it. Now, there's a blankie on the porch swing if'n you get cold.”

  “I wanna go with you and break stuff.”

  “We ain't gonna break nothing. You won't miss a thing that'll interest ya.” Mudder let the hog rumble a little louder and began to move down the drive in earnest.

  Billy crossed his arms. “What if the vampires come back?”

  Mudder yelled over his shoulder. “They ain't coming here. They know better.” Mudder became a rumble and a blur and began fading into the landscape.

  Billy looked around when the sound of bikes faded, not that they were being all quiet doing whatever they were all doing down by the river. He could hear them whoopin' and hollerin' – and the occasional engine rumble. He was pretty sure he could see the light coming off a big fire too.

  The disappointment of no alligators was something he couldn't shake. Billy didn't do well with crushing reality after expectations had been raised to such lofty heights.

  Standing on the steps, he looked into the open screen door. There were lights on inside the house, but no movement to speak of. He figured Ms. Lee Anna must own this joint. Maybe she was some old lady in there sleeping on a hot water bottle and rubbing her bunions together.

  Billy was attracted to shiny things, and the gold painted records which hung on the wall of course attracted his attention. He could see them through a window and partially through the door. He made his way up the porch and wondered if the lady that lived here was a rich eccentric singer.

  Billy pressed his nose to the screen door, but couldn't read anything printed on the framed and shiny records – the old lady lamp which lit up the study was much too dim.

  He tried to pull at the screen door, and it was latched.

  Billy turned his attention to the porch swing and the quilt that lay over it – and he left it there as he snuck into the bog and made his way down to the water and the fire of the Lucifer's Circus Motorcycle Club.

  Billy pushed through the woods, towards the sounds of merriment and hell-raising. He was mostly unprepared for the girl in the overalls with the wild hair who spun on a tire hanging from a rope slung off a tree limb. She looked at him when her face swung his direction. Both of them seemed a major curiosity to the other. Again, she was in Billy's age range – and again the boy was gun shy. Girls he'd met lately in his peer group were turning out to be weird or dangerous.

  Mostly weirdly dangerous.

  The tire stopped spinning and the rope strained. It was about to start spinning the other direction when the girl slipped out and her feet hit the wet earth.

  “Who are you?” They both said this at the same time. The girl laughed and Billy let his guard down just a little.

  “I'm Billy Purgatory. I'm a member of the Lucifer's Circus Gang. Oh, and I'm a lone wolf.”

  The girl strayed from the moonlight, and Billy couldn't make out much of her face, just her eyes and her soft little chin. Her hair was black and seemed to stick straight up of its own volition. Her skin was a cream brown, and her eyes shared the same color – both seeming to offer warming comfort and the promise of new mysteries.

  The little black girl crossed her arms back at the boy and asked rather respectfully, “How can you be a member of a gang and a lone wolf a
ll at the same time?”

  Billy thought about it, and had no answer. “I'm still crunching the numbers on that one. Hey so you live out here in that tire swing or something?” For some reason, the idea of her living in a tire swing didn't seem that out of the realm of possibility any longer. Billy was finding girls in the oddest places – and he wasn't complaining about it really.

  She looked at her swing and then back to Billy. “I live in the house over there by the bridge.”

  “Oh, I was just there. I think we have an associate in common. Mudder Kelroy?”

  The girl nodded. “Yep, know him. Surely do.”

  “So.” Billy's impressions of who was living in that house were suddenly changing for the better. “That must make you Lee Anna?”

  The booming voice at Billy's back corrected him – and made the hairs on the back of his neck stand at attention.

  “Chimera Lee! You get away from that boy and you get back up to this house and go to sleep, girl.”

  Billy turned to find an older version of the little girl, a woman of equal beauty but with a strength that had come from years of hard living out here in the middle of nothing. She wore a long velvet dress of greens with a cloak attached that hung down on her shoulders and onto her back, pressed down by her long black hair pulled into many rope braids.

  She had an expression and form that sent the message she could and would kick Billy's ass if need be.

  “No, that's Momma,” Billy's newfound girl, Chimera, intoned quietly. “She's Lee Anna and you and me are in trouble.”

  “I stay in trouble, dandelion.” Billy smiled, and all this was cut off by the voice of Lee Anna from the edge of the mire once more. “Boy! What are you saying? You stop all that whispering to my girl or we are surely gonna have problems.”

  Chimera started walking towards her mother. “Momma, I was just swinging and this boy came walking up out of nowhere. We were just talking is all.”

  “Mudder Kelroy brought that boy – can't you see he's marked?”

  Billy stepped into a shaft of moonlight with the girl and Chimera turned to face him. Billy noticed that she had the same scar he had across her face, but she also had another which went the opposite direction and crossed her otherwise delicate and warm expression. The two scars formed an “X” and marked her much worse than Billy's single mark.